


I've got you.

by carpethefanfics



Category: Archie Comics, Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Blood, Crush, F/M, Flirting, Ghoulies, Pining, Violence, tw blood, tw violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-03-31
Packaged: 2019-12-30 03:53:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18307664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carpethefanfics/pseuds/carpethefanfics
Summary: She learns about him more and more everyday. This is what she knows.





	I've got you.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first tryst into the Riverdale fic world. I’ve got a slight obsession with the Sweet Pea x Reader trope so let’s see how this goes.
> 
> Enjoy.

 

**I.**

She’s been learning things about him since the moment they met with his hair swept back and his frame towering over her. His eyebrow had kinked ever so slightly at the sight of her before she could feel the false bravado slipping over his face like a mask. The smirking and the crossed arms and the effortless way he rolled his eyes at her sarcastic tone.

_‘You better watch it before that tongue gets you into trouble’  
_

_‘No need to concern yourself with my tongue Sweet Pea’_

She could see him swaying in and out of who he was, who he was trying to be and who he wanted to be. There was a softness in his laugh when Toni made a joke. There was a harshness in his eyes when his friends pulled him away from the comments of the Northsiders who belittled him. There was a strange twirling in the pit of her stomach when she turned back to watch him walk away only to find him already watching her back.

_She wanted to know him._

**II.**

She learns about his quiet nature whenever the whole group is around. She’s somehow part of the whole group now. They’re sitting at the bar and he’s always finding his way to the pool tables with no partner, just him and the cue and utter silence. But he’s listening to them, always listening. 

Then they’re sitting in a booth in Pop’s and he’s found his way to the record player with a few dimes and a somber look in his eyes. He flips through the catalogue of songs as Fangs steals another fry off her plate and Toni’s eyes drift off the the redheaded bombshell twirling her legs on the stools.

She wonders what’s going on in his head. What he’s thinking about when he sinks another ball or when he selects another record. Where did he learn to play pool so well? Is this song his mother played in the morning when she made him pancakes before school? Was there ever a time when _someone_ made him pancakes before school?

She finds her eyes drift towards him more often than not until she’s finally pushing herself to go with him. To play a game or pick a song. It’s easy when she’s standing next her him and their arms brush ever so lightly but a fire ignites in her stomach at that effortless grin.

_‘If you play that song again they may kill you’  
_

_‘Let them try, it’s my favourite’_

**III.**

She first learns about the real pent up anger boiling under his skin when they make comments about the way her legs would look wrapped around them. The moment the words leave the mouth of the man standing before him in the blue and gold jacket she can practically feel the steam. Like he had been caged for too long, been alone for too long, and needs to run his first through a wall. She didn’t know until that very moment that he was a “swing first, ask later” kind of guy. Then his fist connects with his jaw and she’s screaming. 

She could feel it in her throat as they continued to swing and kick and hit each other. She doesn’t know what to do but then Fangs was pulling him backwards, throwing him in the passenger seat of his truck and speeding away before anymore Bulldogs could find their way there.

The guy was dazed and bleeding. His shiny yellow and blue jacked covered in dust from hitting the ground.

She had jumped on the back of her bike without a second thought and sped after them all the way to the Wyrm. Pulling into the bar with her heart racing and her eyes on the specks of red she could see dripping down his cheek.

_‘You’re out of your fucking mind’_

She's holding the ice to his knuckles and pulls out the first aid kit they keep under the bar to bandage up the open cut above his eye. His eyes are watching her, always watching her. His eyes steely and beautiful and leaving so much left unsaid. She feels them on her when she sits back in front of him. Her legs pressed up against his, her fingers grazing the side of his face to get a better look at the wound.

_‘No one ever gets to talk to you like that.’_

The way his voice pierces her made her feel like she had no air left in her lungs and all her blood had rushed from her body.

**IV.**

She first learns about the softness beneath the hard lines and edges of his face when they start spending time alone.

First it had been helping him with English, then trips to the drive-in and walking the railroad tracks after school just to stay out of the house a few hours more. 

The first time she sees his room she feels like he’s finally letting her peer into the pieces of himself no one else gets to see. A fragment of his soul he keeps hidden. There are pictures of his little sister on his dresser in a light blue dress and flowers in her arms. She wonders if it’s from a birthday, if it’s a party, if it’s the last time he got a picture of her smiling. There’s a ragged copy of “In Cold Blood” she had lent him weeks ago with the pages dog eared beside his bed. She wonders if he had read it deep into the night like she had, unable to stop turning the pages until his eyes grew heavy and forced him to sleep. There are scattered camera lenses and straps and film littering the side tables in his room. She wonders where he got them all; gifts or bargains or paid for, she doesn’t know. 

They had laid on his bed that night and talked for hours. Barely touching. The few light grazes of their fingers and shoulders were enough to make her think maybe there is something more.

_‘You really miss them huh?’  
_

_‘I have a family now. I have you guys.’_

**V.**

She first learns about the way jealousy feels when it coils up inside you and slithers across the back of your neck the night Cheryl throws a party. That woman loves nothing more than to bring together the Southside and the Northside for the drama of it all. _Or maybe for the Toni fit all_ , she thinks, but that’s yet to be determined.

They’ve been there for a while and the way the leather skirt keeps riding up her thighs when she moves makes her want to disappear into a never ending black hole. It’s pinching her waist and no matter how many times she shifts the black lace top tucked into it, it doesn’t help.

She’s leaning against the kitchen counter when she catches her eyes on him as she’s scanning the room. She had lost everyone in the shuffling of bodies and the blaring of music but there he was. Tall enough to catch the soft slope of his nose and fine cut of his jaw. Almost as fast as the butteries in her stomach flutter, they’re crushed to dust.

He’s leaning over someone, hand bracing the wall. She can just barely see the soft blonde curls of some girl his face is way too close too and it feels like someones stabbed her in the side. _Hard breathing, tight chest_. She hadn’t thought her feelings had gone this far. Hadn’t noticed when they had jumped into the deep end far from where she could reach them and pull them back to shallow ground, to **stable** ground. 

She catches Fangs as she's slipping her way out the back door.

_‘Everything okay?’_

She smiles and nods. Afraid of what might jumble out of her throat if she opens her mouth. She needs to go home, needs to get away from here. Fresh air and a cool summer night sound like a good distraction from the sad realization settling across her shoulders that she had fallen for a boywho would **_never_ fall for her back. **

**VI.**

She first learns about the unrelenting waves of fear that come from living this life when she’s about halfway to her destination that same night. Her mind had led her down a dark tunnel of how to handle this feeling but her feet had led her subconsciously to the bar. There’s a few lights still on, maybe someones still around to distract her, she thinks. But then she freezes.

_‘What’s a pretty little snake doing out this time of night? And all alone?’_

They hadn’t done anymore than run their switchblades across her skin, slicing up her skin with thinly veiled threats and warnings. But then one painful flick of his wrist made a deep gash under her eye when she just couldn’t hold her tongue back anymore. 

‘ _Fuck you_.’

The drops of blood hitting her chest as they dripped in a curtain down her face.

_‘Run along.’_

She had kept her tongue between her teeth as they slipped back into the forest and she found herself practically running. She had nodded along to what messages the man had to say from his leader. When she slams into the bar she throws her back against the hard surface of the door and lets out all the air still trapped inside her.

_‘What happened?’_

FP’s voice is like a saving grace. She looks up and he’s pulling her forward with alcohol wipes and sad eyes. She doesn’t let the tears spill over, just softly recounts the messages like poison on her tongue. His forehead creases and his brows furrow.

_‘Don’t worry, we’ll handle this’_

He had been the only father she’d ever known. She’s grateful that it’s him here to wipe the blood and bandage the wound. She isn’t sure she could have held back the tears if it had been anyone else.

**VII.**

She first learns about how deep cares about whatever this is between the when she makes it home. A thick bandage across her cheek as she walks through the door, as she slips out of her clothes, leaving her blood stained shirt to soak in the sink. She finds her way into his t-shirt. He had left it here all that time ago and she found she needed it now more than ever.

She’s barely closed her eyes, barely let the tension in her back sink into the mattress when there’s a heavy banging on her door. She stands slowly, listening as the banging gets louder and then swings open the door. 

 **Sweet Pea**. Wild eyed and angry and pushing through the doorframe to take her in his arms before she can even understand what’s happening. He’s got his arms around her shoulders and her forehead is resting against his chest. He’s touching her softy but his arms are tense like she’s glass about to break.

_‘You shouldn’t have left’_

His voice cracks as she runs her hands under his jacket and lets her fingers smooth out the creases of his shirt. She’s overwhelmed by the feeling of him, the softness of him, the way he’s holding her. She can’t help that tears are coming and she isn’t sure if it’s left over from the jealousy that had tightened around her heart earlier that night or the remnants of fear from being inches away from being sliced up or worse. 

But she pushes back from him and even though her eyes are spotted with tears and everything that’s about to come out of her mouth is a complete and utter lie, she speaks.

_‘I’m fine’_

**VIII.**

He first learns about the way he feels about her, the way he's been denying he feels about her, when he finds her home that night. He had been looking for her for twenty minutes at the party when Fangs had suddenly remembered her sliding out the back door. He felt panic rise in his stomach, _she had left?_

When he gets to the bar and FP’s anger simmers down just enough to tell him what’s happened he feels like he could kill someone. He wants to break skulls and smash bottles. He wants to yell at Fangs from not making sure to take her home, he wants to yell at Toni for letting her be alone at the party. But mostly, **he wants to yell at himself.**

He barely says a word when he’s slamming the door to get out of the bar and all he can feel is knots in his stomach as he practically runs to get to her. His fist is pounding on the door before he can eve register that he's arrived. He needs to see her, he just needs to see her face, he just needs to know everything’s okay and she’s okay and **it’s all okay**. 

He’s surging forward at the sight of her and pulling her against him just to make sure _this is real and she’s here and she’s fine_. She’s wearing his shirt and his heart tightens at the sight. It’s practically a dress swallowing her but it feels like she’s his for this brief second. **Just like he’s wanted for months.** Just like he’s told himself _should_ **never** and _could_ **never** happen.

But he holds her anyway and grinds his teeth,  _‘You shouldn’t have left’_

Her hands are warm against his shirt and his skin feels like its on fire at the way there’s only a single, thin barrier between her and him. Then she’s pushing back from him, looking up at him and batting away the tears in her eyes.

_‘I’m fine’_

He brings his thumb to run across the thick white bandage FP has secured and feels that anger on his skin start to dissipate. Just for this moment, just for her. He lets the anger slide deep inside himself so that he can make her feel safe.

He wraps an arm around her shoulder and guides her back to her room without a word. She lets him. She looks tired and worn and he doesn’t want to yell at her from leaving or yell at them for doing this to her. **He just wants to hold her**. 

She sits down on her bed as he toes off his boots and slips off his jacket. They’re lying face to face and he’s swiping his fingers under her eyes to stop the tears. He reaches out for her hand under the covers and lets their fingers interlock.

_‘I’ve got you’_

**Author's Note:**

> https://carpetheotherfandoms.tumblr.com/post/183854114382/ive-got-you


End file.
